Think of something big you want to accomplish in life.

Whatever I­t­ is you’ve set your mind on, there’s you, your goals, and a bunch of unknown, terrifying, exhilarating, rock bottom, uncomfortable things standing in between of where you are and where you want to go.

Big picture goals are like a large realistic painting you view at a distance. When you get closer, you realize the picture was made from dabs of different colors and strokes of movement. Mistakes, creative epiphanies, techniques and layer and layers of work and expression are what turns stretched canvas and some tubes of paste into a masterpiece that resonates through time.

It’s the same with our big goals in life. It’s hard to see how a BIG goal is made when you’re starting at ground zero looking up at this looming mountain, lacking a Sherpa to guide the way. You want to get to the top, but how?

1%.

Doing even just a tiny amount of consistent and deliberate work dedicated to accomplishing your goal will accumulate up over time.

1% doesn’t just add up, it multiplies. The more consistent and good you get at something you love, the more you’ll want to do it.

What’s one small thing you can do today — right now — to get you one step closer to your goal?

Start with 1%, Stick with at least 1%, and one day you’ll be in the top 1%.

I think I come across as naive more often than not to people I connect with.

Maybe I am, maybe I am not.

To me, they mistake naivety for my beginner’s mindset.

You have to be an amateur first — and be okay with it — to become a master at what you do. That’s one of the big reasons why I pick up on things rather quickly. I’ve had friends comment on how frustrating it is that I can learn skills so easily. That I’m just “disciplined” or "talented”, but the honest truth is I’m not. I’m no smarter nor better than the average person working at Starbucks. I’m just open to new experience and opportunities for learning because I know it will upgrade my performance faster.

I put curiosity first (and wear it on my sleeve).

Ping-pong for example.

I barely played ping pong growing up. Just wasn’t my thing. Every time I picked up a paddle I felt like the ball was completely out of my control.

Late last year I started playing a lot of ping-pong because there happened to be a table at the office. I sucked at first. Could barely keep the ball on the table. And if you had thrown a curve at me, I would have immediately hit it straight into a game over.

But I kept playing. Kept improving. I was open to failing because failing gave me instant feedback on what not to do.

Now, I can play. I’m not going to win any international tournaments any time soon, but I feel confident in my game.

Without curiosity, without a beginner’s mindset, without being okay to kneel down and bend the knee towards someone who is better than you at something, there’s no chance of learning or reaching mastery.

Pretending to know all that you need is closing yourself off from becoming better at what you love. Faking it helps build confidence, but it doesn’t help build skill. That takes practice and the curiosity to absorb lessons from success and failures.

And if you do fail, and look like a bubbled-boy idiot, who cares? At least you’re not boring. I’d much rather look like a goof and keep improving my skills and performance, over never trying because I might fail.

Related Insights

"In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, in the expert's mind there are few." — Shunryu Suzuki

"You can learn new things at any time in your life if you're willing to be a beginner. If you actually learn to like being a beginner, the whole world opens up to you." — Barbara Sher

"I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life." — Steve Jobs

You don’t need to already be great, in order to learn to be great. Yet, we default to treating skills like that.

"Oh, I'm not good at this, I guess I'll stop..."

No! Don't stop because you're not good, if you really want it, keep going because you're not good yet.

I don’t care what your genes say, or how much talent you have or don’t have. Mastering a skill requires effort and persistence. If you practice those and are willing to put in the time, greatness is inevitable.

Daily habitual challenges make the master.

Even a little effort done consistently goes a long way towards greatness.

It’s hard (maybe impossible) to build a personal brand or company around multiple interests when you’re at the beginning (I️ know, I’ve tried). It’s too confusing to your audience.

Trying to be all things to all people leaves you with nothing to show and no people. To rally fans around your ideas, you must first plant your flag into ONE thing you love.

Q: What’s the main cause behind what you do?

Plant your flag in a category you love, make it a lifelong pursuit, and as your audience grows to expand into your other passions.

Lifestyles aren’t made in a day, they’re made with consistent actions each day. Huge difference.

The biggest creativities and entrepreneurs didn’t start by doing and knowing it all. If you want to build your own unique lifestyle similar to who you look up to, plant your flag. Become really good at what you do, then expand into other interests. Your fans will follow. Eventually, your fans will love you for you (your weird, eclectic, quirky self), not just what you do. They come from what we do but stay for our personalities.

You don’t need the latest and greatest gear to become an exceptional creative.

A $3000 guitar will certainly sound better than a $50 one you bought at Walmart, but buying I­t­ won’t make you a better guitarist.

An $8000 Leica camera over a beat up iPhone 6 won’t make you the next Chase Jarvis if you don’t even know the fundamentals of photography.

Equipment is expensive (especially if you are like me and want to learn EVERYTHING) and I­t­ adds up. And don’t forget about the lifestyle that is attached to each item. The maintenance, the accessories, and other costs to entry. While I️ love a shiny new instrument as much as the next Shmoesph, I️ don’t need I­t­ to play brilliantly. The equipment doesn’t make the creative. A well-made instrument will enhance the creator’s ability, however, it’s still a reflection of their hard work and time they’ve put in.

To be a better creator, we must hone and practice our passions. Over and over again, until they­ become instinct.

Focus on what you have, instead of what you don’t.Work with what you can afford right now, versus waiting to express your creativity when riches fall from the sky into your bosoms.

Be the person who sets the stage on fire with a crappy beat up instrument rather than a ten thousand dollar one with no skills to back up the luxury.

Essentially, what I’m saying is

Don’t let your gear be better than you are.

Own your beat up gear with pride. And don't let lack of resources stop you from pursuing your art. Get creative, find ways around it. Make lack of resources a part of your art form.

As long as I­t­ works, you’ve got what you need. In the meantime, hone your passion and save up for something beautiful and elegant, worthy of all your hard work.

If you had complete mastery over a skill or passion you loved, what would your life look like?

Paint a picture in your mind. How does your life feel, how does it taste, what does a day in the life look like? Maybe you're further along in your journey and have reached mastery, what does it feel like to you?

Mastery isn’t being complacent at the top of the mountain. Mastery is being fully capable of creating an idea from your head and making it come to life. Mastery is helping others and showing them how to be capable too. Mastery is continuously learning more, and exploring the entire scope of mountain ranges, versus never leaving the hill that you're on.

So what does mastery feel like to you?

For me, mastery is waking up with energy and happiness. It’s making a living and meaningful change doing what you love. It’s practice and honing essential habits every day. It’s having the freedom and cheerful spirit to spend time with those you love. Mastery is seeing challenge, fear, embarrassment, and failure as old friends — life lessons to forge a better you. Mastery is having the skill and wisdom to create with impact and live for something bigger than yourself.

Mastery will probably mean something different for you, depending on what you want to master, and that’s fantastic. What a boring world this would be if we were all the same LEGO pieces.

What matters is that you're giving it your all to create that ideal day and feeling you have when you think of mastery.

Related Insights

"Only one who devotes himself to a cause with his whole strength and soul can be a true master. For this reason mastery demands all of a person." — Albert Einstein

"If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all." — Michelangelo

"Wisdom does not show itself so much in precept as in life - in firmness of mind and a mastery of appetite. It teaches us to do as well as to talk; and to make our words and actions all of a color." — Lucius Annaeus Seneca

When something goes wrong, I️ tend to default to being discouraged. If someone reprimands me or tells me I️ can’t do something (you can’t accomplish x, you’ll never be able to do Y), its easy to fall for their point of view or, at the very least, let I­t­ effect my mental performance. But this is not a successful mindset.

Complaints, criticism, disbelief, or hate towards you is inevitable when you’re doing something out of the status quo. (Something the hater wishes they would do themselves)

The status quo is the collective agreement of the way things are, from the people and culture that surrounds you. The funny thing about status quo’s is that they are different depending on who you surround yourself with. What’s normal and expected from your typical college student is wildly different from what’s normal and expected from billionaires changing the world. What’s abnormal for your circle when you break the status quo can be natural to another groups point of view. Reading, for example. If you are surrounded by people who hate reading or saying something like ‘what’s the point of reading when you have a TV?’, you’re going to be shamed into the same mindset. And if you start reading they’re going to give you hell for I­t­. But on the opposite spectrum, point out to me any billionaire who doesn’t have a massive library and are constantly soaking up knowledge.

Once you realize that status quo’s are not all created equal, you can begin to take BOLD actions and create massive improvements in your life.

Instead of being discouraged, a successful mindset takes what the person says and turns I­t­ into fuel. Coal to the fire. It’s an “I won’t stop” or “I’ll prove you wrong” mentality. Although you’re not doing I­t­ for them — you’re doing I­t­ for you. I️ won’t stop — no matter how hard or scary I­t­ gets — because I️ know that I️ am capable of achieving my goals with enough time, effort, and intent.

By thinking this way, not even pain can stop you.By adopting the mindset of the type of person you want to become, your dreams are inevitable.\

Falling off the treadmill is inevitable. Someone’s bound to bring in a box of donuts 🍩 to work. You’ll inevitably miss a day of writing (insert your own pursuit here) because you were sick or traveling. But jumping off the boat doesn’t mean you should say in the water. In fact, getting into the habit of reinforcing your passion and reason why you are making habits and going after goals in the first place is key to achieving them.

I used to have a binge mindset. Dang, I ate a cookie... oh well might as well eat 100 more. I told myself I wasn’t going to watch TV today... oh well, guess I’ll watch THE ENTIRE CATALOG on Netflix. But just because I mes up shouldn’t give me permission to go crazy. What if I messed up every day this week? What would that do to my health or long-term progress? If I binged watch shows an entire week I would end up being a vegetable, unable to do anything my heart desires.

Missteps are a part of the learning progress. Mastery comes to those who fail and yet keep going anyway.

“Nostalgia is denial - denial of the painful present... the name for this denial is golden age thinking - the erroneous notion that a different time period is better than the one one 's living in - it's a flaw in the romantic imagination of those people who find it difficult to cope with the present.”

— Midnight in Paris

Sometimes it can be frustrating to do so much, yet feel so far away from where you want to be.

Wherever you are, whatever you are aiming to do, there’s always going to be that next level.

A place where you’re smarter, better, more connected...more ______ than you already are. And the more you do, the more there is to do.

There’s always a level up you can climb and a level down you can atrophy. That goes for every aspect of your life too:

Money:Working at Starbucks for minimum wage > working at a 9 to 5 for 10k a year > 50k > 100k > Becoming a millionaire, Billionaire >

Business:Bootstrapping a startup > Getting your first client/customer> Making a profit > Growing your team > Exiting or IPO > Becoming the next Amazon, Google or Apple >

Loving the process

The next level is a lifelong pursuit. Striving for greatness is a fine balance between being good with where you are while pursuing a better you (and life). In our connected world of follows, downloads, likes, and shares, you have to have the right intentions — personal growth, helping others, making deep connections etc.— behind your actions. Pursuit, with the right intentions, can be a fun process of striving for the next level of performance. However with wrong intentions — for personal gain (money, power, attention) — will be a nightmare and leave you in a cycle for wanting more more more and being miserably unhappy. Growth vs. Greed. Passion vs. Dissatisfaction. Happiness vs. Longing

Yesterday I made a list of the micro-skills of mastery, skills that if mastered will create massive improvements in all areas of our lives.

Tonight I want to talk about learning. My aim here is to start building a master learning playbook to teach myself (and anyone like me) how to master the art of learning. Why learn how to learn? Because learning is a universal skill that affects all aspects of our lives. By becoming a more effective learner, you will be able to develop any skill, trait or habit you desire.

Questions I have:

Q: How can we teach ourselves to learn? (Learning how to learn — or meta-learning if you want to get fancy pants-y)

Q: What are the books, blogs, courses, tools and other resources we can add to our learning playbook?

Q: Who are Masters of Learning that we can learn from? How makes learning look easy? What resources do they recommend? What questions do they ask? What habits do they have? Who do they learn from?

I want to get to the end of my life and be like a piece of origami paper.

Worn, folded, and forged from a thousand lives lived.

A lifetime of learning, pursuit, and adventure. A life of meaning and worth. A life filled with friendships, creativity and boldness.

Otherwise what was I living for?

Sometimes we have to take a good hard look and ask ourselves, 'Am I ALIVE or am I just existing?'

Complacency is insidious. It creeps into our lives through comfort and success.

I'm not telling you to throw out your blankets and sleep on a pile of hard candy. I'm saying make sure what you give your time to — what you do on a day-to-day basis — aligns with the vision of the life you want to have. And if you don't have a vision for your life there's no better time like the present. It's hard to see the macro when you're living in the micro, but our lives are the sum each day we have on this earth. What does your day look like? If you're going through setbacks — keep going. If you fear something — do it. If you're experiencing pain or failure — Reset your mind, body, and focus. Start living for the extraordinary.

For the Last 8 Months, I’ve been sleeping on my parent's couch. (Hard to say, but it’s true)

But in all honesty, life couldn’t be better.

Okay, you might be wondering how have I adopted this mindset?

My life imploded into oblivion after my health continuously became worse.

Here’s what happened:

I sprained my neck about 3 years ago. The first year was hell and it put a lot of things in my life on hold.

I burnt myself out at a job where I was barely making enough to pay rent let alone anything else.

I was unintentionally exposed to bad mold from my apartment which led to weird health issues that were hard to pin down.

Every day I felt more tired than the last. When you go to bed tired and wake up tired you know something is wrong. (But the question is what?) Continuous Signs of Fatigue, Do I have CTF? The worst part is not knowing what’s wrong.

I attempted to make my side-business more than a side-business at the worst possible time. It worked at first, but after having some bad-egg clients, things got worse. (And cue financial problems.) My girlfriend was also having job issues, so I was helping her as much as I could.

I kept talking (complaining *cough cough*) circles around fatigue, ache, money, and other problems that made me and everyone else blue in the face. I started identifying who I was with the problems I had.

I felt isolated and alone. Unable to keep up with my friends, be that energetically or financially.

It’s difficult to be yourself, your whole self, when you’re tired, broken, broke, despairing and on the verge of tears.

All of these setbacks were a one, two, PUNCH on my psyche and on my desire to be the best version of myself I can be.

But here’s the punch line:

I wouldn’t change any of it for the world.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned the past few years, it’sYour greatest triumphs come from your worse setbacks.

What separates those who use setbacks to their advantage and use them to surpass where they were, versus those who give up and never recover? (And how do we become the former rather than the latter?)

You are not your problems.

Having an injury or bad job, or health issue, or anxiety, or ______ (insert pain-point here) doesn't me you are that experience. Everyone has issues, even the larger than life characters we look up to, but that doesn't mean that's your identity. Pain is a shared human experience. It's not meant to be bottled up instead. It's meant to be shared and relieved by the hands of others. Pain is a touching point to guide, inspire, and related to others through there own pain.

Every moment in my life where I’ve been broken down and beaten to a pulp by failure and setbacks, Has been the path to my greatest success and growth. As much as I️ would rather not feel the anxiety, frustration, pain, illness and all the negative outcomes of facing setbacks, I️ now see the value and blessing of going through hard times. Once you see the blessings in disguise, you having something to focus on besides the pain itself. Knowing there is a kernel of truth in pain and that truth will help you achieve your wildest dreams is how we can take advantage our worst experiences and allow us to build an extraordinary life.

There are hard-earned lessons in pain. (It’s hard to see this during, and might be impossible to really know what I’m talking about unless you’ve gone through your own share of setbacks) There are also opportunities and abundance in pain too.

Where am I today?

I’ve got a new apartment, one that I’ve always dreamed of. I’ve got a great job working on Pass It Down and working with Paul Cummings. My business started to thrive when I️ made it my side business again. My relationship with Gabriella and my family has improved. And best of all, I’m thinking less about me and more about you and how I️ can make an impact on your life and on the lives of others everywhere.

How did I get here? What do you do when you are facing down the barrel of a setback?

I️ asked for help. I️ reached out to friends to see if they knew of any work available I️ could take on.I️ said yes to opportunities that came my way, big or small. I took chances. I created challenges for myself.I pitched ideas to others to collaborate. Not all of them said yes, but one, two, three yeses are better than none. One yes is all you need to get going.I️ invested money in going to the doctor and have started to unlock the solutions to my health and energy problems.

I’m still working on my health, my friendships, finances, spirit, creative pursuits (like this blog) and other areas of my life. But as long as I️ focus on improving in each area every day, and remember the lessons learned from my experiences, I️ know any setback I️ face I️ will be able to turn it into my greatest triumphs. And you can too with yours.

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

Action Steps:

Share your pain

Look for opportunity and truth when you are facing down the barrel of a setback.

Related Wisdom:

"Grief can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life's search for love and wisdom." — Rumi

"The struggle of my life created empathy - I could relate to pain, being abandoned, having people not love me." — Oprah

"A lot of what is most beautiful about the world arises from struggle." — Malcolm Gladwell

"Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward." — Henry Ford

In a world of Me Me Me, what if I did the opposite?

What if I️ lifted other people up instead of me?

Of course, I want Renaissance Life to be huge. I want to create a massive tribe of friends pursuing mastery and living life to the fullest. But is pushing out one more social media post really going to do it for me?

Binge reading Ryan Holiday’s blog has shown me how timeless our work can be. I’m reading his thoughts from over a decade ago, and yet there they are — fresh as the day they were conceived. What stands out most to me is not the insights (although there are a bunch of them) but the connections he made along the way. And the same goes for us.

My writing is important, but it’s the connections I make that matter.

That’s why I’ve started interviewing Creatives Like Me on the blog.I want to create deep and lasting bonds with likeminded humans.I want to surround myself with charismatic and energetic people who are striving to make the world a better place.

Action Steps: Focus on the weculture, not the me culture. Focus on lifting others first.

Pushing your capabilities through practice and ritual.

“When you do something every day, you're only going to get better at what you are doing.”

— Joshua C. Green , Ep. 10 of The Renaissance Life Podcast

Do you want to be an extraordinary writer?How about an insanely good artist or musician?A super-connector? An exceptional conversationalist?Health Shaman? Master Yogi?All the above? (Me! over here!)

Then it’s time to take on a daily challenge.

Inspired by a couple friends (Josh Green and Travis Knight) who I’ve interviewed recently on The Renaissance Life, I’ve decided to take on a daily writing and blogging challenge. I am going to write and blog every single day for an entire year. This is day 20.

We all have these dreams of greatness and desires to live an extraordinary life, but getting from where we are to where we want to be can be hazy. It’s like we can see the peak of the mountain but the journey up is covered in a cloudy malaise of discomfort. (Like a kid who needs glasses and can’t see the whiteboard in class) Most people have dreams but not everyone has the belief system and is bold enough to step into their discomfort zones and challenge their capabilities.

Your mountain is your own, I can’t tell you precisely how you can get up to the top — But I can show you what you what has worked well for others and what I am going to do to climb my own mountains:

Deliberate practice and daily ritual.

Deliberate practice meaning we aren’t phoning it in. We’re pushing ourselves to our limit every day, and practicing and trying out new strategies that will make us smarter and more creative at what we do.

And Daily being the key word here.My daily challenge is writing and blogging, so the amount of time I will spend will depend on the types of blogs I want to put out and how long it takes me to make them happen.

Imagine yourself one year from now after you decided to take on a daily challenge. You put in the time, energy and effort to practice every day. After practicing every day for an ENTIRE year, where do you think you will be?

Much better than you would have been if you didn’t decide to challenge yourself.This is how time can be our ally. Time — like money — has a compound interest effect. By investing in small daily practices that add over time to something great. Small actions lead to big change.

This isn’t going to be easy — and that’s the point. Our goal here is to push ourselves to be something more than we thought possible, and to grow our abilities faster by putting in more time than we would normally give if we were practicing ‘whenever’. I'm writing this at 9:50 PM after finishing one job and about to start another job. (I'm crazy) But I'm taking on a daily challenge because I believe it can change my life, because I've seen it change the lives of others.

I’ll be talking more in-depth strategies and examples about daily challenges soon.

Plot Twist: There is an actual limit to how much we can do at one time.

I️’ve always been late to this party. (Mostly because I️’m in permanent denial) ‘Wait, you mean I️ can’t do everything all at once?!’

Right now, Somewhere in time and space, an economics class is talking about opportunity costs. (Pour one out for all the economic homies) The term describes the idea that choosing one opportunity prevents you from choosing others. And it’s true, there’s only so much time, energy and work you can give in a day. If you want to master basketball, you’re not going to have the necessary time you need to master guitar too. (Well.. you can try but you’ll be a jack of all trades master of nada)

I’ve been experimenting with where my line in the sand is when it comes to how much and how many pursuits I️ can have at once. (Because I’m crazy) What I’ve learned is I️ can be quite resilient with the amount and variety of things I️ can hold in my head.. however (like everyone and their mamma) I am limited by the 24-hour cycle. But more importantly, doing too much at once gives me the opposite of want.More more more doesn’t give you peace of mind, happiness, creative space — it sandblasts away all of those and leaves you as a shell of a human. (aka about as interesting as a broomstick in a vacuum cleaner world) And it's just not a great way to live. On the worst days you feel rushed, overwhelmed and like you're making zero progress in a million things.

Whenever I️ fall into the fallacy of ‘I can do everything all at once’ my life becomes a nightmare and I️ need to re-evaluate. (before I implode) Life isn’t about how much you do, it’s about how much you give to what matters to you.

How do we know what matters most to us?

Look at everything in your life and ask yourself, ‘Am I️ phoning this in?’‘Is this important to me or just distracting me from what’s important?’

If it’s not important — if it’s a distraction from what you really want — why are you doing it? Because it’s easier to do more than do less.

Choosing less is HARD (Believe me I️ know more than anyone)It’s something I️ need to work on. It’s just hard for me to say no to opportunities when my previous year was so difficult and rot with no’s.

But more won’t bring me a meaning life filled with Renaissance, friendships and purpose.

Action Step: Choose What’s Important to You; Learn to say no to everything else.

Action Question: Am I phoning this in?

Keep Pursuing,

— Josh Waggoner

Related Wisdom:

“Most people don’t know why they’re doing what they’re doing. They imitate others, go with the flow, and follow paths without making their own.”

“Don’t be on your deathbed someday, having squandered your one chance at life, full of regret because you pursed little distractions instead of big dreams.”

“Just pay close attention to what excites you and what drains you. Pay close attention to when you’re begin the real you and when you’re trying to impress an invisible jury.”

If you’re like me, you have all these big aspirational goals and visions in your head of what you want your life to be.

These goals are clear-cut and motivating on paper. Buuuuut then life happens. Responsibilities, commitments, debt.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t have the freedom and flexibility yet to build a writing cabin in the woods so I can write my novel.

I have to find ways to do it in between two full-time jobs, time spent with loved ones, and a side business.

Things come up. Some of them truly important, others that feel important at the time. Everything and everyone around is vying for your attention and energy. So there your vision of the future sits, in dream status.

How many dreams of a better tomorrow exist only in people’s heads?

But if you are reading this, I know you have a desire to be more. You want to make change in, not only yourself, but the world.

You here the phrase, ‘life is a marathon, not a sprint’ but that leaves an important piece out:Life is a marathon where at the finish line, you die. Morbid, I know, but vital. (Pun intended)

We can’t just jog our way through life.

Sure, we are making progress and doing important things, but are we giving it our all on what’s important to us?

Vision is longterm thinking, but lived on a daily basis.

Vision is not fixed. Your future desires can change and improve as you grow and expand into a better person.

Keeping your vision in your mind will paint how you see the world. Everything you do will be viewed through the lense of how to make your goals happen. Opportunities and ideas will be abundant.

Hone your vision by honing yourself

Read. A lot. Learn from people if different circumstances and walks of life from you. Study the greats. Craft your vision of your future around what has worked for others before.

Make small, yet bold moves towards that future every day.

We make think on our past experience and have our thoughts towards a better tomorrow, but the vision of what can be happens in the actions of our today. What we do in the present not only defines how we feel about our past going forward, but creates the future we all desire. I’ve said it a million times, and will say it a million more until everyone in the universe hears it — Small action leads to big change. Take bold moves towards your future every opportunity you can today.

Whatever obstacles and pain you’ve faced in the past, your future is determined but what you do in this very moment. You have the opportunity to write your own story.

Remember, dreams don’t just happen, they are made. And ‘future’ ‘vision’ are words that elicit powerful emotions and motivations, but your future lies in your today. Getting things right today and the next today, compounds into a life where your vision is a reality.

After going under the name Renaissance Man Life for the last year and a half,I am officially the proud owner of RenaissanceLife.com

I’ve been agonizing over not having it for a long time now. I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent on hover.com, name.com — and every other domain registrar on the planet — looking for a domain close to it. (TheRenaissance.co? RenaissanceLife.blog? RenaissanceJosh.com? Close but no cigar-scented candle)

I hoped I would get RenaissanceLife.com, but the seller wanted $10,000 for it. (That’s a lot of donuts.) After a year of negotiating it down from who owned it (sitting on it like a troll under a bridge), I couldn’t be happier.

For me, Renaissance Life is an investment in myself. A commit to keep pursuing and pushing my abilities. It’s a promise and affirmation saying I can and will build the RL into a media company focused on helping us reach mastery and create an extraordinary life.

Names are important.

Any idea I have that I think has potential, I immediately come up with a name for it. Names give your ideas a grasp of reality. With a name, you are own step closer. You have edges you can grab hold of, climb up and plant your flag on.

Consider my flag planted.

What are you planting your flag on?

Why Renaissance Life? What does it mean?

Renaissance means rebirth.

From the combination of the French verb /renaître — ‘to revive’ and the noun/naissance/ — meaning birth comes a word that lives near and dear to me.

The historic Renaissance was a time of innovation and human potential from the revitalization of Roman and Greek classics. To put simply: It was an age of discovery, creativity and pursuit of excellence.

Today we face a new renaissance — The Renaissance of Ourselves.

Your renaissance life begins the moment you decide you want to recreate yourself and grow into a better person. Modern life changes at break-neck speeds, so too, must we. We must become more resilient, adaptable and creative to be who we want to be, to do what we want to do. Dreams of a lifetime don’t happen with wishes. We must create them happen.

Maybe for you that means doing something you fear. Starting a restaurant, building an app, running a marathon. Or maybe it means a rebirth from a past failure. A bad break up, lost friends, a poor career.

By choosing to live a Renaissance Life, you’re choosing to believe that you can and will turn your trails into triumphs, and learn how to become a master at what you do, despite setbacks, pain, and fear.

My greatest moments of pain and failure have become the most defining moments of my life. Isn’t that crazy (stupid) to consider? I would never wish bad on anyone, but through my own troublesome experiences I come to appreciate more, desire to be more and to life my life to the upmost.

I know that because you are reading this, you must desire change in your life. You want to be different and create a meaningful life for yourself and your loved ones, but you just quite haven’t figured out how yet. How do I motivate myself to do the things I want to do, but just can’t seem to get myself to do them.

When I think about the people who do, versus those who don’t, they have intrinsically linked their desires and values to their actions.

They don’t just talk about things but do them.

In my mind a champion is not someone who wins, a champion is who does. They have already decided they are gonna win in their mind, and then they go out and do the best they can do.

Despite whatever comes their way, setbacks, failure, fear — they are going to do something anyway.

Where does this motivation come from?

It’s early, not even 6 AM yet, you get out of bed, put on your shoes and head to the gym.

That’s Motivation.

It’s soo early, the suns still asleep and so should you, you swat your alarm clock and go back to bed. Rinse, repeat. It’s 7:49 so you know you can’t prolong it any longer. You roll out of bed and head to work.

1. Motivation is a Skill.

The first insight on the motivation of champions is understanding that — like most things in —motivation is a skill. We aren’t born with the champions value to motivate ourselves to pursue, that must be learned and forged from experience.

2. Know what you want.

Motivation comes from a goal driven mind. If you don’t see the end in mind, how can you possible get to your destination?

3. Set yourself up for a win.

Small nuances in habits can dramatically increase your chances of success.

For example, If you want to start getting up at 6 am to write, don’t just go to bed whenever you want — Set a get-ready-for-bed alarm for 30 + 60 mins before —

Put your alarm clock across the room or better yet in your bathroom. You have to get up and walk to it, rather than just leaning over and slapping it. By setting your phone alarm next to the sink, you’re in arms reach of splashing a little cold water in your face to wake up your senses.

That's the key — Champions do the hard things, by making the small things easy. Always always always keep your values in arms reach.

In my office, My guitar is out in the open and ready to for me to play. I can just go over and grab it and start working on a song.

I keep some version of a notebook or notecards with me at all times, so If I have a writing idea I can jot it down and revisit it later.

By keeping your habits and tools within arms reach, your success will also be in arms reach, ready to be grabbed.

4. Adopt the Do It Anyway Mindset.

What most successful champions won't tell you is that the work itself sucks. It’s hard to start a business or blog every day or write a book or work on your health and fitness.The best things in life are difficult and downright painful. But the reward for doing them far out places the anguish of not doing them. Don’t become the person who does nothing for their dreams. (You know the ones) The way they talk, their dreams are the most important thing to them, but they haven’t done a single thing to make them happen. When things feel hard — Do it anyway. When you’re tired, lonely, unmotivated, lazy, embarrassed, scared, and all manner of difficult feelings — Do It Anyway.

There’s no reward like the one when you don’t feel like working towards your dreams but you do it anyway. You feel good.Once you have that, nothing can stop you.

Lewis became a master of connecting.Maria became a master by connecting ideas from across time.Paul became a master of speaking, teaching and emotional intelligence.Ramit became a master of money and psychology.Pat became a master of podcasting and business by helping others.

We all have our influences in real life and on paper. Titans of our industries. But no one starts at the top. (And if they did they wouldn’t have the values to stay there.)

The question is what strategies and insights can we learn from them and apply to become our own thought leaders. How do we get from 0 to 1? (H👺ll, how do I get from 0.01 to 1?)

I see writing as a direct window into the soul. Our thought process, fears, strengths, ideas — who we are, etched a period of time. (Even lies give us valuable insights into their psyche.)

That’s why I’ve decided to start binge reading blogs of thought readers I follow and enjoy. To know where they started, and understand how they become who they are today. I don’t want to be Tim Ferriss, or Pat Flynn or whoever, but I want to similar things they have created for lives. I want to be able to learn, create, and connect without being encumbered by if I’ll be able to pay rent next month.

Of course a blog is just a piece of their life, but even a small slice of what it takes to be successful is enough to create radical change in our lives.

And I figure, If I’m going to binge something, might as well make it something that improve my life and makes me a better person. (… …. okay fine fine, I’m still going to binge Stranger Things too. :)

Here are 5 ground rules I’m following:

1. I am binge reading at most two blogs at a time. (Two because I want to find connections and correlations between the two influencers) 2. I will read every relevant post, but if they seem useless to my life I’ll skim them.3. Any time a blog sparks an idea, be that a writing prompt for Renaissance Life or an idea I can use for my work (at 60Watts, boldsheep, Pass It Down or Paul) I will immediately start working on the idea until completed.4. If any blog post mentions something I should do (action steps) I will immediately do it before moving on. Whether that’s a challenge, business advice, or anything that resembles increased happiness and wellbeing.5. Some Influencer don’t JUST have a blog but a podcast, books or other areas of interest. I will binge those as well.

I’m looking for patterns, insights into life and how they become who they are today.

If I am every going to be worthy of the title of a Renaissance Man, I’ve got to learn from the best.